


Carry on home

by Kono_Rohan_Da



Series: Rohan's Whumptober 2020 [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Bokuto Koutarou Whump, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Feels, Friendship, Haikyuu!! Manga Spoilers, Heavy Angst, Hope vs Despair, Hope vs. Despair, Human Trafficking, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Non-Graphic Violence, Slavery, Touch-Starved, Volleyball, Whump, Whumptober 2020, background kurodai - Freeform, day 2: kidnapping, i love it, that's a good tag
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:48:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26773906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kono_Rohan_Da/pseuds/Kono_Rohan_Da
Summary: The day the annual Tokyo training camp ends, Bokuto Koutarou is kidnapped. With no way of getting home, his chances lower when he's sold and transported to a different country where he knows nothing and nobody in this new place which is supposed to be his jail until he's sold again or dies.But it looks like even with the light in his eyes becoming dimmer and dimmer, lady luck still feels like pulling a few favors for him.Whumptober 2020 | Day 2 | Kidnapping
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji & Bokuto Koutarou, Bokuto Koutarou & Kuroo Tetsurou
Series: Rohan's Whumptober 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948426
Comments: 58
Kudos: 53





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> :D

Bokuto Koutarou had only just turned eighteen years old. It was the day after the yearly Tokyo training camp, this year also having a guest school of Karasuno from  _ waaaaay  _ up in Miyagi. It was so cool! They’re accents were a bit different and they seemed softer in comparison to the players on the other teams. He liked the first year, especially. Especially Hinata and Tsukishima! Kageyama is a good setter, he admits, but not as good as Akaashi. It’s almost enough to bring a smile on his face when he remembers his best friend, Kuroo, introducing him to Karasuno’s captain, Sawamura Daichi. The soft, warm look on Kuroo’s face when he looked at Sawamura with a small vulnerable smile on his face allowed Bokuto to dig up memories of all the shojo mangas he’s read, replacing the protagonists with the two instead. 

He flexes his fingers in their rope bindings, unable to see their movement. They itch to touch a ball, to reach up up up into the air and feel the air pushing against the skin of his palm as he brings it down, quick as a whip and as powerful as a hammer, to slam the ball down on the other side of the court. 

That was one week ago. 

He was walking home from the metro stop. He, as usual, called his dad when he boarded the train, got off it with the rest of the third years and Akaashi at their usual stop, and was about to enter their residential area. One of his three older sisters- his favorite one- was back from university for the weekend so Bokuto could spend some time with her, and he was excited for that! Athletics ran in the family- his eldest sister (older than him by seven years) had held the title of best high school setter. His second older sister five years older than him is a tennis player. And then his favorite, older than him by four years, is a martial artist. All of them play professionally. 

He feels like a failure to his sister, he thinks. She must be so worried. Knowing her temper, she’s probably exploding at anyone he had talked more than a word to at his week at training camp. But he wasted it. Wasted of all those hours dedicated to sibling bonding, with her tossing spikes to him and him practicing whatever variant of martial arts she’s learning so she can use him as a sparring partner. It also helped him keep his muscles tone and lean, a full body workout that increased his flexibility as well, allowing him to make better shots and have a wrist flick so close to that of Itachiyama’s ace. 

It’s funny. He was strong. He was on the taller side of the population. He knows how to defend himself. But he was still kidnapped. All it took was a well-placed end of a call, grabbing and tying his hands, and gripping his neck until it bruised. 

It still hurts. 

He curls tighter in the mall confinements of the box he’s locked in, hands tied behind his back, knees forced to be drawn to his chest, head bent over to rest his forehead against them. He wonders what his sisters are doing. He wonders what his dad is thinking. Does he think Bokuto was kidnapped? Does he think he got caught in a crash, just like his mother? What about Akaashi, what about his teammates, what about his coach? What about Kuroo? Did anyone call Hinata or Tsukishima and tell them that he’s missing?

The first three days had him in a house or apartment. They tried to silence him, they tried to break him. They didn’t wear masks because they were confident that he would never be able to free himself. But he knows better. He’s an ace- his team needs him. He led them to the semi-finals in the fall Interhigh. He led them to victory at Nationals in the Summer Interhigh at the end of his second year. He’s going to win again and again, and when high school doesn’t give him enough victories, then onto the professional league where he’ll be the king and the court will be his kingdom 

But if these people succeeded, none of that would happen. If they succeeded, he would be muted on his own volition, his independence taken away. He would become submissive. He would become a slave if he wasn’t sold ( _ sold)  _ to someone who would harvest his organs and sell them for more than they bought him for and make the rest of him into human hamburger steaks. 

It was scary. Really scary. He wouldn’t imagine any of his friends getting kidnapped, much less himself. It was one of those things you would think up in the middle of the night and then suddenly become relieved when you realize it won’t happen to you. It’s something you hear on the news for a snippet- student kidnapped, woman paralyzed, dead body- before switching it to the current volleyball game. 

They tried a few things. Bringing his skin close to fire. Punching and kicking him until he bruised. Starving him. They didn’t want to kill him and they said they want to keep away from marring him, but only because that would lower his worth. 

On day four, they didn’t give him any food or water. They told him that when he stays absolutely still except for blinking and breathing for an hour, only then will he get food. He failed. Day five, he got a small bowl of old rice, still cold and slimy from the fridge. He had to eat with his mouth, like a dog, like an animal, but food was food. 

Day six he was stuffed in this box and was given food once. If he had to use the bathroom, he had to do it here, stinking up his confinements for a few hours, pushing his mouth against one of the holes poked for oxygen- breathing from there was his only relief. 

And now he’s crying. 

“D-dad” he sobs “A-a-akaashi, Kuroo… I don’t wanna be here anymore.” He presses his forehead tighter against his knees, body jostling and head hitting the top of the box at a harsh movement of the car or whatever he’s in. “I don’t want to…”

* * *

For one week, Akaashi Keiji wonders what happened to Bokuto-san. When he asked his teachers, they wouldn’t give him straight response. When Kuroo called him, he couldn’t give him a response either. To be honest, he was considering calling the annoying middle blocker to ask him if he knew about Bokuto’s whereabouts. Coach had started to get angry, but that passed when Konoha said that Bokuto never came to any of his classes. 

It was two weeks later, surfing through his phone on the way to the locker room to change for practice when he saw the latest news, only posted half an hour ago:

**_High School Volleyball Star Bokuto Koutarou Missing as of Fourteen Days Ago. Police and Private Investigations Find Nothing. -_ ** _ Read more- _

He doesn’t press  _ -read more-  _ like his mind urges to, like the logical part of his mind wants him to do under the impression that he could find something that the police and investigators hadn’t.  __ Instead, he turns to his heart. He fumbles to keep his phone from dropping, quickly sending the article to Kuroo, and  _ sprints  _ to the locker room. 

He never saw any of his senpais cry before. There is a first time for everything, he thinks, as he wipes away his own panic induced tear that manages to leak out during the run there. Bokuto-san...missing. Kidnapped. The day they came back from training camp is what the day was fourteen days ago. With a slowly rising panic, he realizes those days, those weeks, can become longer. They can stretch into months, into  _ years _ . 

Maybe they won’t even get his best friend back. 

Closing his eyes as he walks to the door to find coach and tell him what he found out, he prays to the gods that Bokuto is at least alive. He doesn’t care what else, just make sure that Bokuto is kept alive. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter of angsty owl. This chapter was supposed to be uploaded earlier today, but I decided to add a bunch of stuff, modify here and there. Just making it more saturated with angst. There really isn't a lot of Bokuto hurt/comfort out there, so here I come, offering y'all the goods with the excuse of the holy month of Whumptober (October? Never heard of it). If you like Haikyuu....maybe check out my other Haikyuu!! fics? If this doesn't have enough angst for you, I also shove packets of them into my fics.

All those weeks, they came down to this. The constant stream of tasks, being forced to master the most menial of things. Burned hands with the marks covered with makeup. Accidental scabs getting the same treatment where they can’t be covered. He stands with a clean body and poorly bandaged cuts on his back. A metal collar is clasped around his neck, eyes cast down and hands still at his sides, barely brushing the white shorts and t-shirt he’s clad in. 

He loves owls, he remembers. Sometimes when he was little he would pretend to be one. Dehumanization back then was done in a fun way: pretending to fly, flapping his wings and jumping to imitate the motion, sleeping on his stomach because that’s how owl sleep. But now he doesn’t find it fun. The collar itches where it digs into his skin but its been on his neck so often, he’s gotten used to that. 

Isn’t that sad?

“Do I have one billion yen? One point five? Raised to two! Two point five billion. Two point eight.” The numbers continue to climb higher and higher. Bandaged fingers with half torn off nails twitch at his side.  _ They couldn’t hide that  _ he thinks with pride, the pangs of pain that come from there syncing with his heartbeat. He keeps his head down, long hair blocking the view of the buyers and most of the bright light that threatens to burn dots into his vision. He shivers. 

“Sold, for eight billion yen to the man in blue in the back!”

Bokuto’s eyes close and his shoulders slump even more. His fate is sealed. He feels like he can’t escape now. No matter how much he might want to, he’s no more than a chained and trapped animal now. 

* * *

“For Bokuto” Akaashi says, brow set, body covered with sweat. In his mind, so many strategies stream through his head. How to spike to each of the players. How to accommodate for different gaps in their defense. His hand twitches to naturally go through the hand signals. The line below the five of his jersey feels unnatural. 

“For Bokuto!” The rest of them cheer before heading back onto the court. 

They beat this team. 

They beat the next.

They cheer on both Karasuno and Nekoma as they face off each other. 

They cry and celebrate when Nekoma loses and Karasuno wins. They comfort both teams some time that week. 

They stand proudly in the pre-game lineup of the finals against Itachiyama Academy. 

They stand in shocked silence when Itachiyama’s ace comes to them during their warm-up to tell them that Itachiyama and their part of Tokyo also wishes for the best of Fukurodani’s missing ace, and that he can make it home soon. 

They stand in incredulous silence when Washio manages to fumble the ball over the net, winning them the tournament.

When graduation rolls around, they cry when members of Karasuno, Nekoma, and numerous others come to Tokyo for the Japanese High School Volleyball Association’s live tribute to Bokuto Koutarou. 2012-2013  _ Best High School Wing Spiker in the Nation _ . And even though it’s an honor, even though they wouldn’t of thought about jumping Bokuto from ranked four to ranked first and the award if he had been...here, he still got it. His memory still has it. 

Akaashi shakes his head. Bokuto-san isn’t dead, he thinks. Even when he also gets misty eyed with hundreds of others as they listen to the same speech and watch people he has never seen before go up to the podium and talk about how Bokuto had impacted their lives.  _ These aren’t eulogies  _ he thinks.  _ It’s a tribute _ . He likes to think that somewhere, wherever Bokuto is, he is watching this. And he knows that this isn’t an acceptance of his disappearance, but a call for him to come back home.

Kuroo is one of the people who give a tribute to Bokuto. He’s the last one to. He’s the one everyone listens the most attentive to. Only he speaks the truth. Only he speaks as if he’s telling someone how Bokuto is like, as if preparing them to meet him, to give them a heads-up so they aren’t overwhelmed by awe upon seeing the ace. He talks about Bokuto’s moods, something none of the people before addressed. He talks about how they met in their first year of high school at the annual training camp (He called me a lazy cat. I called him an over-exuberant owl. He asked me what that meant. We became friends). He regales the tale of how Bokuto does his hair everyday as if it were instructions for what to do at a shrine. How he experimented with temporary dies to streak through his hair before settling with black. How he has organic hair gel to use when he goes to bed because he hates the feeling of his hair being loose. 

The stories make Akaashi laugh. They’re all so  _ true _ . He ignores the strange looks and whispers he gets and savors the looks of chock when Kuroo calls Akaashi up to the stage because “You'll never really know Bokuto Koutarou if you’ve never met the kid I like to tease dedicated his life to him- pretty boy setter  _ Aghaaashi _ .”

He goes to Bokuto’s father and sisters after the tribute. None of them have his friend’s white hair. Black, dark brown, bleached. The father has some grey hairs and he’s where Bokuto gets his eye color from. None of them have the large innocent looking shape, though. It’s not a surprise that they knew of him even before the tribute speech by Kuroo. Bokuto had told them stories and showed them photographs. And there’s the games too, of course. 

The next time he goes to practice, he tells the coaches that he accepts the position of captain for the next school year. But only under one condition: he wants his number to be number four. Because even though it will always be Bokuto’s number, he knows that wherever the teen is, if he were to see him, he would laugh and smiles ( _ that’s my ‘Kashi _ his brain supplies).

They don’t win the Summer tournament, but once again, they did make it to Nationals. Karasuno wasn’t there, but neither was Shiratorizawa. Once again, Miyagi supplies a new school, a wildcard: Dateko. 

Fukurodani beats them and the white and blue seagulls who beat Karasuno the last tournament, then a few others before being forced to keel before Inarizaki. He feels like he’s disappointed his team, he’s disappointed the jersey he wears. Then he swears that he’ll do better in the next tournament, the fall tournament. The new first years, almost exploding with potential and determination, promise the same. A selfish part of him hopes Bokuto is at least having fun, that even if he misses home, the wherever he is isn’t that bad. 

* * *

His life ended and was replaced with a nightmare so long ago. A month after it started, he was sold. He was ferried across the ocean. No more Japan. No more hope of rescue. No more hope. At least Korea is closer than, say, Italy. But that’s what makes it horrible. He has crazy dreams of swimming across the sea, drowning, and his dead body floating to the beach and being found somehow by Akaashi. He dreams of trying to stowaway on a ferry only to be caught and turned over to the police. He dreams of telling someone what is being done with him only to be laughed at being returned to his buyer.

This is his eighth month away from home. During month one, he wasn’t allowed to talk. Mostly because he couldn’t speak Korean (he didn’t know) and was forced to dedicate himself to refreshing his Japanese in the solitude of his bare-back room, decorated with a single futon, pillow, and blanket, and also forcing himself to learn Korean from the two thick books that he was provided It was also at the end of the month when his buyer, mister Kim, beckoned him over to the dining room table. It’s a grand thing. Mahogany, he thinks. There’s also a chandelier, western sized. The first time he entered the room for anything other than serving food. And he’s made to sit. And he’s given, for the first time a month, a Japanese meal.

Kim looks at him, lips flattened into a thin line. His eyes are a light brown with a few specks of darker brown, like an eggshell. His hair is black. So is Bokuto’s, now. And the reason for that is really quite simple.

The man himself isn’t the cruel one- no no no: it’s his  _ wife _ . The wife, as Bokuto likes to simply refer to her so it makes her seem more like a beast, a terrible monster in his mind, loves to raise a hand on him. She’s the one that he was mainly bought for. In the long run, he’s cheaper than a crew of servants to take care of their manor-like penthouse. At least they don’t have any children to inherit any of her cruelty. He doesn’t have a family to worry about. Being a slave to this house is his life now. She would punish him for not understanding something she says in Korean, either too fast or the words unknown to him. The fear of her hand and its ability to turn the closest thing into a weapon is the main reason he made sure commands were some of the first thing he learned. It was her anger, her disgust at him, that led to her roughly grabbing his hair and dragging him to her private bathroom. She forced him to sit on the toilet before taking her hair dye and sleeping gloves on before changing his strands of white into rough pitch black things that blend with his dark streaks, the chemicals making his scalp burn. It’s something so little- it’s only hair. But for some reason, to him, it’s the worst she they ever did. Like she tore away a piece of his identity. 

He could barely recognize himself in the mirror anymore. And the days he could, it made him feel like crying. It had him hunching over the sink, cradling his face with thinned fingers, shoulders trembling. 

Which brings him back to the present. 

“I apologize for my wife’s treatment of you” he says. “It is hard for her to understand you are not a slave but a servant.” Bokuto doesn’t look up, continuing to chovel the delicious ramen into his mouth. He learned a long time ago not to talk back, so he doesn’t correct the lie. He’s not a servant, but a slave. There’s no escaping this life. Kim sighs, looking back down at his ramen, sighing as he twists his chopsticks in the mass of noodles, liquid, and vegetables. “You have been very well behave for the past month. It is time I reward you. You can ask for anything, as long as it is within reason. Sadly, this does not include your freedom or a phone call.”

Bokuto stops eating, swallowing the chunks whole down his throat. Only recently did his back stop hurting everytime he moves. 

“A volleyball” he says in horrible Korean. The books did a horrible job of telling him how to pronounce things and his ears have only just learned how to pick apart the syllables that people speak without understanding what they mean. But he tried his best to make sure he said volleyball correctly- it’s his favorite word. “And...the ability to play the game.”

“That is reasonable considering your background” Kim says with a nod. “I have an associate who coaches the national team. Even though you a servant of mine, you will get the best when you deserve it. You have done a good job.” He sets his chopsticks done, clasping his hands together on the table before wiping them with the embroidered silken napkin. “You will practice three times a week with them. I will come to all of your games and practices under the pretense of family until you have earned the right of being independent. Although your sellers did say you have been properly trained” he adds as an afterthought. “Of course. you will have to be punished if you try anything. You also need a proper Korean name instead of your strange Japanese name. What was it, Ko?” Bokuto internally cringes. “You will go by the name of Jin.”

Bokuto stops the frown, instead nodding his head in thanks. 

“Do you have any questions?” 

His mouth is moving before his beaten-in filter can properly function. 

“Why...Jin?”

“I thought you would appreciate it. Although it is only one half of a normal Korean name, I’ll have to think up the next part of it, it is a common name in east asia. Japan as well. Although, I admit, I chose it for it’s Chinese translation: gold.” Bokuto bites the bottom of his lip to keep it from quivering. The fake nod of thanks turned into a true feeling inside of him but it feel disgusting to himself that he’s feeling it because he shouldn’t be here at all- but...he is. 

“ _ Thank you _ ” he whispers. Kim stands up. He expects the man to leave but what he doesn’t expect is the pat he’s given on the head. Then Kim leaves. And it leaves his head tingling. That was the first time in so long that someone touched him in a way other than to hurt.

For the next week, the wife started treating him better. Less threats, more commands masked as requests. More smiles, although the beatings are still harsh and leave him with a few more cuts and scars than he had when he came. He finds himself occasionally enjoying himself, especially when he goes to practice. He’s also given a weekly allowance.

And sweet joy, playing volleyball. Once again, the beloved sport is his only source of relief. His situation has forced him to become fluent in conversational Korean and a tutor was hired to teach him the written language. He platys with the U19 team three times a week and he even makes a few friends, making up lies and forcing himself to be quiet lest Kim think anything bad about him. He hears the coach talking to Kim many times- a lot of those times, it’s about letting Bokuto join the team. But he doesn’t know about his condition, why he is here in the first place. 

It’s funny that even though he was never invited to join the Japanese U19 team, the South Korean U19 is begging to have this “Kim Jin” play for them. He wonders what Akaashi would think if he were to tell him this!  _ Bokuto-san, the Japanese team are foolish for not offering you a spot anyway _ . 

He misses home. 

During practice, he bites back flashes of pain when a fall presses into a bruise. He tries not to wince when a pat on the back digs into a cut. He tries to make himself think of himself as  _ Jin  _ rather than  _ Koutarou _ . Because there’s no way he’s leaving this, when he fears making a single wrong move at any given second, when he doesn’t have privacy in his own room, when the only thing he has been able to keep the same about himself is volleyball and his memories. It’s that that makes him remember one of the schools that are a regular at national’s: Inarizaki. “We don’t need memories” their motto is. “We don’t need memories” he finds himself muttering a few times. Because at this point, he’s basically been forced to become a robot, the humanity in him only there so that he can function properly. 

We don’t need memories. He still finds himself lingering on them. Wishing, hoping, longing. Watching the street from the window and wondering if somehow a familiar face will pass underby because they’re on vacation in Korea for some reason. 

And now, back to the present. Salvation. He makes himself think what it is in Japanese because even his thoughts have become Korean. Salvation came on the eighth month away from home, in May, a month after he was supposed to graduate. A month into the time he had planned to try out for a professional team.  _ It felt like years _ . 

To be specific, salvation is a taste of home. A blend of two parts of him: Japan and volleyball. It’s a match between South Korea’s U19 team and Japan’s. Japan’s, which he had forgotten, had an ace who is the same age as him, who he liked to think was friends with, who he had occasionally texted due to the two of them being top five aces so having to meet for interviews and stat collections, and also because in their first and second years of high school, they both went to the national youth training camp. Ushijima Wakatoshi. Unlike Bokuto ( _ Jin _ ), he looks exactly the same. Piercing olive eyes, brown hair, intense gaze. Jersey number four. 

South Korea’s ace had been injured a few days prior. They didn’t want to lose to Japan. So, in an incredible move of bribery which Bokuto experienced during dinner, sitting in shock and with hope, he watched as the forty-something year old coach revealed his knowledge of who Bokuto actually is and threaten to tell the world what the Kims did: kidnapping a child. But that hope was quickly crushed when he learned that the coach isn’t going to help set him free; the knowledge is used to have him play as Korea’s new ace so that they can win over his home nation. Punishment is guaranteed for a loss.

But he isn’t beaten for a few days. That’s good. But he’s forced to study a  _ lot  _ of Korean. 

Two days before the game, it is discretely announced, barely known to even the most attentive of volleyball fans, that a Kim “Jin” Jin-Seong has joined the U19 South Korean team for the short remainder of the season. 

But when the match comes, when Bokuto’s heart hammers in his chest beneath his white uniform, he yearns to call out to Ushijima. He also, with a jolt, also recognizes Kageyama on the bench. It’s disappointing than Hinata or Tsukishima aren’t there, but he’ll take what he can get. 

But none of their gazes widen at the sight of him.

None of them recognize him. Understandable, he bitterly thinks. His muscles have lost size and are still there but much smaller and more lean. He doesn’t stand as confidently. He acts different on the court. He rarely misses because careless mistakes means punishment which means  _ pain _ . And his hair, never feeling hair gel of being away from his face for months, being dyed often so that flashes of white can never be seen, going as far as tinting the color of his lashes and eyebrows when he had been officially signed onto the team. 

Korea wins the match. Bokuto, the traitor- he earns the game point, jumping up and doing a one-man block on Ushijima, hoping,  _ hoping  _ that the guy would recognize him if only a net and a few centimeters of air separate them. 

He doesn’t. 

He only asks his name. 

And he numbly tells the truth with a fake smile on his face. 

* * *

Daichi watches with one of his roommate, Oikawa, and his other roommate (and also boyfriend) Kuroo, as they watch the fourth person who lives with them get blocked impressively quickly by South Korea’s replacement ace. 

Kuroo was quiet the whole game. They don’t usually watch the national matches for any team other than the actual Japanese national team, but this was Ushijima’s final season and this was the last game that would determine order of play for the Asian continental tournament. It would give all the teams a scope for what they’re going to be facing and also get fans hyped up to see which fans would be facing who and a preview of what the teams are like before they fine-tune themselves to pick at the weaknesses of specific teams. 

The worst thing, he feels, is how the ace looks like Kuroo’s missing (dead, some have said) best friend. He’s slimmer and taller than Bokuto was. He doesn’t have white hair, hair a dull pitch black. But those eyes. That facial structure when the camera would zoom in on him. 

Kim Jin-Seong. He was like another Ushijima- never smiling or looking excited except for if you looked directly at his eyes. But this Jin character, Daichi thinks, he looks like he doesn’t want to be here. And the only times he grows more active, actually  _ excited _ , is when he goes after Ushijima. He’s noticeably faster and tails the ace a lot. 

“I miss him” Kuroo admits, pulling Daichi close to him, lips brushing against his forehead as they try to distract themself from tomorrow’s exam and the fried.

Two weeks later, Daichi fails to comfort Kuroo like Akaashi does, the only other person besides the Bokuto family who was impacted so badly. And now it’s Bokuto’s funeral. 

_ They’ve given up _ he thinks as the coffin burns. He wishes that instead of their tears being wasted on drying and soaking into the skin of their faces, they would fall on the coffin and douse the fire. 

* * *

“Hey, can I borrow your phone?” Bokuto asks one of his teammates a few weeks later at practice. 

“Sure!” They chirp back. 

“Thanks.”

Bokuto quickly opens the browsing app and without any hesitation, opens a japanese keyboard and looks up his own name. 

_ Bokuto Koutarou, missing for ten months.  _

_ Missing Fukurodani boys volleyball captain Bokuto Koutarou o\receives title of best wing spiker for the 2013-2014 reason months after Fukurodani’s victory at Spring Nationals without their ace.  _

_ Sakusa Kiyoomi and Ushijima Wakatoshi talk about first ranked ace Bokuto Koutarou. _

_ Bokuto Koutarou: Missing or Dead? _

_ Nekoma High and Fukurodani Academy hold a fundraiser to help continue the search for missing student Bokuto Koutarou.  _

_ Watch the National Volleyball Association’s speech on Bokuto Koutarou. _

_ Interview with Akaashi Keiji and Konoha Akinori the life of Bokuto Koutarou.  _

Accompanied with that is a photo of a cremation ceremony, a picture of his excited face accompanying the online article. In the first photo, he can make out the unmistakable hair of his best friend and something in him shifts. 

_ They...they think I’m dead _ . It’s only been a few months. Ten. He’s missed so many birthdays, so many landmarks. He looks up Fukurodani too and smiles when he sees Fukurodani’s statistics and Akaashi. He looks older. It makes him sad. The boy has become taller but he’s still skinner, hands large and fingers slim (larger than his own, he remembers when they compared them in the locker room). His jersey has the number four, a line under it signifying him as captain. It must trip with the other team, the setter wearing the ace’s number. But if he remembers correctly, Karasuno’s libero is their number four. 

He removes the Japanese keyboard, erases the history of the last hour. When he is sent to go get the groceries (he earned their trust a long time ago. Too easy. It must be the money that makes them gullible- he had fooled himself too) he also goes to a travel agency with all of his allowance crammed into his jacket pocket and buys a one-way ticket to Tokyo. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you like straight guys cooing over BL, watch this anime: the high school life of a fudanshi  
> I watched all 12 episodes of it yesterday and it was the best 36 minutes of my life (36 minutes long). I recommend watching the end-credits too because it has the theme song and I can't get it out of my head, even though the only words I caught were "BOY MEETS BOY" and then fancy stuff afterwards


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has 2000 more words than it originally had. Editing 100

The next day, after donning his South Korea uniform to head to practice, Bokuto also hides a hastily bought ticket, his spare cash after having it converted to yen, and the passport that he got a month ago for the flight to Thailand he sat through only a few days ago for a practice match in his practice bag, nestled next to some energy bars and drinks. 

When he left the house, Kim ruffled his hair. The wife kissed his forehead, regardless of the fact that a few more bruises and scarring cuts were added to his back the night before; they’re going to make both practice and the flight uncomfortable. His body scream for him to flinch away, to curl upon itself, with even the slightest movement, be it a twitch of a facial muscle of a finger. Their touches, they can so easily turn from a casual touch, a guiding hand for his print-perfect Korean, a hand on his to properly stir the food in the pan, to the wielder of the closest thing, pain and hurt guaranteed. 

His heart is pounding all throughout practice. He has a drop in his mood, a mood-swing, but just like the dozens of times its happened already, he covers it up and forces himself to hit perfect straight after straight. He wonders if Akaashi would of been prouder of him if he had managed to do this months ago. How many points had he lost his old team because of that disability?

Finishing his cool-down stretches before everyone else, he takes the locker-room air freshener can and coats himself and his bag with the whole can so that it won’t smell, using toilet paper and water to clean the sweat as best as he can from below his armpits, behind is neck, and a wipe across the rest of his skin before taking his bag and a deep breath. His skin is nearly tingling with anticipation and fear. A bit more of the latter. 

_ I’m doing it. I’m going home _ . 

He manages to leave the building undetected. He’s lucky they’re in Seoul with it’s busy crowds, foreigners that tower over most, and close proximity to the airport. Only a frightening fifteen minute jog. Fifteen minutes to the start of freedom. But fifteen minutes is also enough time for Kim and coach to notice he’s not in the building anymore, that he’s been in the locker room for too long. Enough time to ask one of his teammates what he’s been doing in there for so long only to look confused and answer that Jin’s not in there. His eyes flit over signs as they run, quickly processing and translating Korean that he didn’t know a lick of ten months ago. How much a person can change when they have to. His brain goes back a few steps. 

Ten months.

His eyes prickles and grow warm. He slows his jog a little, switching to a brisk walk. 

He’s going to see everyone again. His friends. His family. Dad. His sisters. Akaashi. Kuroo. Konoha. Washio. Kenma. So many names. So many people that he needs to talk to, say things he’s never said before. But now that he got a taste of never being able to talk to them ever again, he’s probably going to be even more talkative than before but who cares! He’s going to get to be  _ himself  _ again. 

He passes through airport security in a breeze, his jersey identifying himself to the people milling about, both civilian and vocational. He’s allowed to break airplane policy and bring his extra amount of drinks and food in his carry-on due to them thinking that he’s probably going to some training camp or tournament. 

The plane is small. He has to sit next to someone. He’s a businessman, but the presence of another person who could hurt him by some stroke of luck keeps him awake for the whole hour and a half. But it passes quickly- he’s mesmerized by the view outside, of land becoming smaller and smaller, people becoming ants becoming nothing, buildings looking like little stones, and then the ocean. 

He nearly cries when he looks out the window and instead of ocean he sees the main island of Japan. When the plain finally lands, all the Japanese seems to hit him like a truck. It’s such a drastic change. The cultures are so different, the people, even the architecture! He takes a few minutes just to turn around in circles and take everything in as everyone walks around him, speaking a language he’s only heard himself speak. 

“Hello, do you need any help, sir?” One of the airport personnel ask him in Japanese. They sound concerned. They’re shorter than him. Bokuto feels like giving them a hug, but he holds himself back. 

“No, thank you.” Bokuto breathes in smooth Korean, adjusting his bag. He’s quick to exit the airport, already knowing the layout from the times he’s had to fly across the country for volleyball-related reasons. 

The streets of Tokyo are much more crowded than that of Seoul. The people here are a little bit taller on average too, more heads of black than the crazy neon colors he’d spot in the other country’s streets. He double takes when he sees a head of orange, of silver, of blond tipped black. He hopes that he’ll see someone familiar, but he’s disappointed. 

Someone familiar...what about  _ somewhere  _ familiar?

He quickly goes to a park he know is nearby. Nekoma is close to the airport, he eagerly remembers. The information starts to flood his head. Even though Nekoma prefers to train and practice indoors, using their fancy gym equipment and running laps around the gym, the sometimes go to the park for jogs when Coach Nekomata complains that they’re being too loud. Bokuto knows because usually when Fukurodani joins them for joined-practice of a practice match, that’s what the coach says, and Kuroo just laughs and points out when he’s going get a new batch of original content. 

He finds a bench, one mostly devoid of bird droppings. And takes out an energy drink and bar from his bag. He consumes the two while keeping his eyes peeled for familiar faces. Kuroo is probably in college, or maybe he finally decided that volleyball is life and he should go pro. He takes out another energy drink; he hadn’t realized how dry his throat was before. So that means he’ll probably have to look out for Kenma or Lev, maybe Akashi and the other second years if they’re visiting. But that’s only if his luck strikes and they actually go to the park...

Tokyo...he’s missed it so much. So so so so  _ so  _ very much. The people here with different features that he knows but has to become accustomed to again. Language which he hasn’t heard being spoken by someone other than himself since the Japanese national team came. His heart thumps. Now he’s close to Nekoma. He’d go to Fukurodani, but Nekoma is closer. He swallows. He realizes he missed Kuroo and his friends graduating. He missed his own graduation. He wasn’t the one to hand over a new jersey with the number one and a line under it to Akaashi, asking him to be their new captain in his place. 

He sits on the bench for another hour, thinking and taking in everything. Kenma. Kenma is a third year now, and Kenma is friends with Akaashi! If he’s able to get to Kenma, then Kenma can get Akaashi

He ruffles through his bag. A few more drinks, bars, the cash he shoved into his pocket, a pair of practice clothes, a spare jersey, socks, kneepads, tracksuit, and volleyball shoes. He takes his passport out, flipping it open to look at the picture of himself in it. 

Jin. He recognizes Jin- he doesn’t see Koutarou in the colored image printed on the smooth papery material. Tan skin has given away away to too-pale skin, any small blemishes he had gone and pores replaced by baby smooth skin because of the intensive daily skin care regime that was beaten into him. Black hair and eyebrows, some of his eyelashes grown back white and making the area around his gold eyes made larger by weight loss look like a barcode. He quietly chuckles to himself at that

He snaps the passport shut and slides it back into his pocket. He slides his hand under the back of his jersey so that he can press one of the bandaged cuts, the pain that flares up confirming that  _ yes- I’m home _ .  _ I’ve been here for a few hours. This really isn’t a dream _ . 

But it’s been months. Almost a year. What is he doesn’t have a home to go home to anymore, if they all moved on?

He’s already on his feet and moving before he could doubt himself even more and feel like clawing and ripping his skin to tear the fakeness away. Hands in his jacket pockets, feet kicking any pebbles in his path. A breeze comes by and ruffles his hair and he tilts his head, savoring the feel of it on his skin. 

Nekoma. 

* * *

He never makes it to Nekoma.

Nekoma finds him first. 

It’s not that long of a walk to Nekoma, he’s sure, but he lost himself a few times before finding a familiar path again and continuing his trek. It’s scary too, when it takes too long for him to understand what’s being spoken around him and when he doesn’t recognize a certain spot of the city. But he knows what direction Nekoma approximately is, so he tries his best to keep true to that direction. When the Tokyo Tower starts to get closer and closer but still so far away, he relaxes and knows that he’s going to be able to find his way to the next thing that will bring him even closer to truly returning home. 

Even though it’s hot, he keeps his track jacket on. It feels safe, the cloth on top of his arms and encircling his wrist. It also keeps him alert; he’ll know when someone touches him. It’s as if all that time made his skin hypersensitive, alarms blaring in his head when he senses someone about to touch him. 

He walks with his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched forward to make himself look shorter than he actually is. Something that his sisters loved to do was measuring his height, like a gaggle of three moms sharing a kid. He got a growth spurt sometime in those few months and his height doesn’t help his urge to shy away from the population. He needs to thank his sisters for being so nice. He also needs them to mark his height on the side of the doorway to kitchen so that he can get a stronger feel of normalcy. 

“Hey Daichi! It’s the Korean guy who defeated Ush’jima.” Bokuto flinches and turns his head, recognizing the voice. And there, he sees someone who isn’t faceless in his mind to the rest of the crows. He’d recognize that hair anywhere. 

“Oh I remember him calling to make sure we were watching the match. It was fun seeing Tobio-chan on the bench and seeing them lose. Yoo hoo~! Spiker-chan!” An slightly familiar brunette calls out. 

“Oikawa…I don’t think he knows Japanese.” 

Bokuto doesn’t know why but even though he recognizes two of these three people, his insides tell him to  _ flee _ . And one thing he’s learned how to do well in his time was to hide. He wants to...he wants to...Kuroo’s here. And Daichi’s here. And they know Ushijima too. And there’s some other random guy there. 

It looks like his friends have found each other and made new friends. It doesn’t look like they need him anymore. They probably have more friends too and are trying to erase all memories that they have of him. He would even erase his own memories of himself- they’re all so burdensome. He feels bad for them. He shakes his head.  _ Stop thinking like that _ . But then what is Daichi doing in Tokyo, Jin? He lives in Miyagi! He’s either in college here, playing for a team, or working here. And he’s with Kuroo. It looks like the cat caught the cream. His disappearance probably helped with that. His reappearance will probably break them apart.

Kuroo...he looks exactly the same, he observes from where he’s hidden himself at the side of the pavement closest to the storefronts and business building. And so does Daichi. His heart softens when he remembers the looks Kuroo would give Karasuno’s captain. Looks like he was successful at some point, judging from their held hands. And Oikawa, he remembers where he recognizes from: volleyball magazines. He’s also from Miyagi. Popular for looking like an idol but also for being a killer setter with an awesome jump serve. 

He wonders how Akaashi is doing… 

He’s pulled out of his thoughts by a slight touch on his arm. He flinches away and a “What is it-” is already out of his mouth (and in Korean too, not Japanese) before he cuts himself off, looking down at Daichi’s face. He looks like he might of grown taller too in those months, but Bokuto’s definitely taller thanks to whatever couple of centimeters he gained. 

“Um, hello. My name’s Sawamura Daichi” he introduces himself with a bow. “Sorry for bothering you, but you’re Jin-Seong, right?” 

“It says it on my jacket” Bokuto replies in Japanese this time. Daichi rubs the back of his neck, embarrassed. The corner of his lip twitches up. Same old, same old reliable Sawamura Daichi- even the passage of time will never change him. 

“I know of you Daichi says. “I watched your game against Japan a few months ago. But, I’m not here to ask for an autograph or volleyball.” He hesitates “You look familiar to someone I knew”  _ knew  _ “Do you have family in Japan by the name of Bokuto by any chance?” 

“Yes” He says without hesitation. “Actually, Bokuto Koutarou”  _ I’m Bokuto Koutarou _ “My cousin. I missed his funeral”  _ I wasn’t dead  _ “Do you know where his family grave is?” Daichi looks sympathetic. 

“Yeah. We go every week. Let me just tell my boyfriend- he’ll probably want to talk to you about Bokuto, compare stories and stuff.” The hope that Bokuto had felt upon looking down and seeing that Daichi had come to talk to him, it’s gone now. There’s just a sort of emptiness. They really have moved on. He thought he was just being too negative before but it looks like they can’t entertain the thought of him even being alive; it’s not like the things that happens in mangas and books with the good guys always winning happens in real life. 

He guesses...he can pay tribute to himself? He already knows where the family grave is- he goes there once in while to visit his mother. It’s not really close, but he can walk there, even though it’ll take some time. 

So while Daichi walks back to Oikawa and Kuroo, Jin is quick to join the crowd again and continue walking. All he can do is keep on moving, the world around him blurred and disjointed, random memories passing through his head as he takes turn after turn, trusting his feet to keep him moving like they did before. 

Before he knows it, he’s sitting in front of his grave.  _ His grave _ . It took him a few hours, exiting the city, catching a bus, going to the mountain where the graveyard that holds his family’s bodies is held. He wonders how it must of felt like, watching an empty coffin burn. How much hope you must of lost in order to reach that point. To give up on finding your child, your brother, alive. 

There are gifts. Plants and flowers and photos and cards. 

_ And all of this is mine _ he thinks.  _ I’m just a dead man walking anyway _ . He kneels on the stone platform, taking the photos and letters and separating them into two piles. He goes through the photos and eventually, all of them are scattered around him. Photos of him and his team. As a baby and with people he doesn’t recognize. Winning. Losing. Talking. Sleeping. Photos he never knew existed but makes tears fall out of his eyes anyway. 

It doesn’t feel like these are for him. It feels like a different person. He sees pictures of a chubby baby with white hair and large gold eyes, sucking on the horn-shaped foam feather of a toy owl the same size as him. There’s a picture of a first year in a Fukurodani uniform with the number twelve printed on the jersey, white hair gelled up, gold eyes just as large as they were when he was a baby, smile bright and gleaming. Jin but his hand on a photo of a close-up of the boy’s face. The color contrast is immense. 

By the time he’s finished going through the incredible amount of photos, stacks of them, and shifting through memories that seem more clear than they ever have been before, night is falling. He moves the photos and letters back to the protective alcove. All of the letters except for one. Then he looks at the stone, at the latest engraving. 

**木兎 光太郎**

There’s a little owl cut into the rock too. Not really a traditional thing to do, but it makes him smile.

Jin grabs one of the plush owls that were left on the alter. Then he takes off his jacket, shorts, and jersey in order to put on a practice and his tracksuit pants, getting ready for the chilly night. He sits in front of the large stone thing as he eats his dinner of another protein shake and an energy bar. Then he leans back against the side of the alter, sitting on his duffle so his but doesn’t go sore, draping his jacket around his shoulders like a blanket. He snuggles the owl closer to his chest. He takes the one letter he hadn’t put back under the protective alcove-  _ A light read before bed _ \- he thinks humourlessly, his brain readjusting to the kanji and hiragana that he hasn’t read in so long. He’s slower now, but he can still read it. One letter becomes two becomes three in the dim light of the lamp-poles. _ Such a liar- you said one _ . His knees draw closer and closer and soon, he’s shaking and shuddering, forehead resting on his knees to try and keep the panic attack at bay, owl clutched tight because  _ he’s so alone.  _ The tears soak soak his clothes, the owl, leaving the area around his eyes puffy. 

And he cries himself to sleep, like he’s done so many times before. 

* * *

Jin’s woken up by a kick to the leg and a hand on the front of his shirt, pulling him onto his feet before he’s even awake. His eyes snap open, sleepiness quickly draining from his brain, replaced by a rush of adrenaline and feeling- he’s been through this routine so many times before- and a fist slams into the side of his face, sending him back against his grave, head lightly banging against the stone. The letter he had finished right before he fell asleep falls from his lap, the corner wrinkled, the owl also sadly plopping down on it.  _ Dear Bokuto-san _ Akaashi’s perfect kanji shapes at the top. He was the one to leave the owl for his passed-on soul, a little brown and white thing with yellow eyes and eyebrows suspiciously like his own. . 

“WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?” Kuroo snarls, amber eyes glinting dangerously. “Aren’t you supposed to be related to him?” His lips are pulled back, teeth glinting like a knife. Bright. Sharp. Painful. Slashing into his mind, slashing into his skin, into his back.  _ It hurts. _ “I knew you were suspicious. I don’t know what you type of people do in that country of yours, but here in Japan, we aren’t assholes.” Jin- no, Bokuto, he’s Bokuto- is shaking now, eyes wide as he looks up at his best friend ( _ former- you’re dead, remember _ ). Kuroo has also grown taller.

“I’m sorry I don’t know what I did wrong, Kuroo, I-I, it’s me! Bokuto! It was months ago, but they took me, kidnapped me, and I was  _ sold _ -” there’s a slap across his face. 

“If you’re trying to apologize, you can at least do it in a language I can understand, Kim-san.” His friend taunts and it breaks something inside of him.  _ This is something basic I’ve picked up along the way, little brother- when they hold onto your wrist, take a step back, side step, pull them forward, trip, and use the momentum to either flip them, get your wrist free, or hold them down.  _

So he does that. And it works. Kuroo is pulled forward and he trips him with a food to the shin, not letting him fall on his back put pushing him so he falls on his bum. It’ll hurt for an hour, he knows. 

Before he can get his duffle and jacket and  _ run,  _ Kuroo is launching himself off the ground, tackling Bokuto down the stairs and onto the grass. Kuroo might of had a chance of winning this fight months ago with being naturally faster and skinnier. But not this time. You can say he was forced to become flexible. The perfect athlete, the perfect servant, the perfect whipping boy.

Perfect perfect perfect. A perfect little slave, a trophy boy to display around the house and outside of it when called for. 

Bokuto curls his legs up and kicks at Kuroo’s midsection, rolling to his feet only to be dragged down by his his ankle. Pain flares in his ankle and his bruises where he falls on them. His mouth opens in a silent groan. 

“I can’t  _ believe you _ ” Kuroo snarls as they continue to wrestle, light scratches marking themselves across his face. Before he knows it, Bokuto is sitting on the ground, feet digging into the dirt, scrabbling for purchase, his hands gripping onto Kuroo’s wrists to try and separate his hands from where they grasp his t-shirt. Someone is talking, angrily. The shirt is digging into his neck, threatening to do something. His brain isn’t really processing at this point. Suddenly, he hears a ripping sound coming and his shirt is torn off. Even through his muddled senses he hears the noise and his whole body freezes, goosebumps appearing across his skin. Whoever was speaking cuts themselves and Bokuto’s eyes automatically squeeze shut. He trembles, the pressure on his neck disappearing along with the clothing on the upper portion of his body

“What the hell…” Bokuto takes the moment of shock to gracefully stumble onto his feet. He tries to blink away the tears that well in his eyes. His whole body aches with old and new bruises, burning with shame and humiliation and fear. 

“Kuroo- s-s-stay away from me, please” he pleads. He knows how he looks like: bandaged body scabs on skin; bruises layered over older bruises painting a portrait across his skin; raised poorly healed scars not even a year old which he had to take care of on his own, to try and keep himself alive for another day. All of those permanent markings that he’ll bare for the rest of his life, signs that even though this is the body of Bokuto Koutarou, at one point in time, Kim Jin-Seong also occupied the same space.

He turns his back, even with the knowledge that the injures are the worst there. He walks, defeated, back to the altar, bending over and ruffling through his duffle for his spare practice t-shirt, putting it on before putting the jacket on over that.  _ He knows he knows he knows. I can’t tell him it’s me now. He’ll feel so bad. He’s smart- he’ll put together what happened. I don’t want him to put all together, oh gods no. He’s going to feel so guilty or maybe he’ll be angry with me and then- _

“All of those are recent.” Kuroo quietly says from the base of the steps. Bokuto looks down at him. “My dad hasn’t tried forcing me to become a doctor, buying me medical books just for me to waste the chance to get more knowledge. I’d say those are less than a year old.” The silence that comes after that is tense and awkward for Kuroo probably. For Bokuto, it’s filled with unsaid things that he’ll never be able to translate, moments where any of them could of done anything.

“Your...your name isn’t really Jin.” No question. No opinion. A statement. Bokuto wants to hug him, wants to be held while he cries, but the image of an angry face and a hurtful hand flashes through his head. 

“I” he swallows “I was trying to go to Nekoma, first. Kenma...he has your number. And Akaashi’s. I-I-I” he breaks off form that train of through “I’m sorry, I-I-I’m so sorry, I can’t believe I-.” He cuts himself off, head slumps forward and he looks at the ground, looking at the tears make wet little dots. 

“Oh Bo” Kuroo says, suddenly in front of him. “I’m so sorry I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry I punched you. Gods, I didn’t know-”

“I-it’s fine” he tries to laugh it off. His voices comes off wobbly and cracks where he tries to laugh. An epic failure. 

“I always thought you were still alive. So did Akaashi. I-I spoke at the volleyball thing but not your funeral, you know? None of us did. But, oh gods, what happened to you?” Kuroo’s fingers gently trace over exposed scars no longer covered by makeup. Bokuto’s body wants to lean into it but his brain screams  _ pain pain pain  _ at him, knives glinting along with the words. “When did you learn Korean? Actually, ignore that. First” long arms wrap around him, a hand gently pressing his head onto a shoulder. The violent images that flash through his head disappear, replaced by the feeling of  _ safe _ . He melts into his mold. 

“Ku-kuroo…”

“I missed you so much, bro. I missed you  _ so much  _ dammit” Kuroo cries, holding Bokuto’s head to his chest. He’s so warm. His arms raise and he wraps them around Kuroo, the two of them leaning into each other. 

Even when Kuroo’s tears stop, Bokuto’s keep on running, sobs reducing to sad little hiccups. 

That’s how Akaashi finds them, sitting on the steps of the Bokuto family grave, Bokuto nearly sitting in the other teen’s lap, whose arms are wrapped around him, holding him safe and close, chin resting on top of Bokuto’s head as Bokuto tells him what had happened in the past few months, trading months back and forth. It looks like the people back home also didn’t have a good time. He feels bad for that. 

“Kuroo-san?” Akaashi asks. “Are you” he pales, not recognizing the other teen. “Are you cheating on Daichi-san?” Bokuto’s head shoots up and golden eyes widen behind a curtain of black. And once again, Bokuto’s eyes start to tear up. 

“That’s gross, Akaashi!” He calls, voice not even close to the volume it should of been at. Akaashi nearly faints right there and there but he only falls when he reaches the older boy, and that’s only so that he can also join Kuroo in hugging and crying over the boy who managed to find his way home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He's home! The next chapter should of been the end but then I decided "y'know what? Why don't I stretch out the recovery process by a ridiculous amount..."


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're about halfway through with this fic- yes, I finally got around to editing the next chapter :) I hope y'all like it!

The ride to Kuroo’s apartment is both slow and fast. Slow, because the entirety of the ride his filled with silence and fast because he’s thinking about Akaashi and Kuroo and how his memories of the areas the taxi takes them past compares to the mental images he has saved in his mind. 

His homecoming is...like a movie. Not in the way that there’s a grand celebration or anything, but because it feels like a finale, as if the protagonist returned after a long journey and the ending is kind of ambiguous, leaving you with the scene of the protagonist on the doorstep of a house with the door slowly opening. 

Except this time, instead of him knocking on the door and watching it open, he’s nearly shoved inside by the combined efforts of Akaashi and Kuroo pushing at him. Even then they barely talk. He thinks they’re still in shock. He most certainly still is in shock, hugging his duffle close to him as he sits on an armchair. He looks around, taking in all the details. There was some conversation near the end of the ride in the taxi. This is Kuroo’s apartment, on the larger side since he shares it with four others, one of them being Daichi. The other guy he saw yesterday, Oikawa, he’s another roomate. The last one is Ushijima. When Bokuto thinks of the other ace (former ace), he can’t help but feel a mild sense of distrust. If Ushijima had recognized him a bit faster, then he could of been free earlier. He would of felt less pain. He would of been more  _ himself  _ than the new personality that was forced to be forged inside of him if only someone,  _ anyone _ , had been smarter. 

There are pictures, a lot of them, he notices. A majority of them are made up of the same five people but there are also photos of each of them with different people, of nature, of only people he doesn’t recognize. It’s been months. He’s missed so much, it might as well be a lifetime. 

“Bokuto-san, tea?” Bokuto looks away from the wall, looking up at Akaashi through dark bangs. He never registered it before but Akaashi looks a bit taller. Another thing he missed. 

“Yes. Thank you.” He says, taking the mug from familiar fingers. Gods, he used to whine so much about Akaashi’s fingers being longer than his own. Akaashi sits in the arm chair across the coffee table with a sort of confidence that tells Bokuto he’s been here many times before. That’s good, then. He and Kuroo must be keeping each other company. 

“We missed you, a lot. I know for sure that I missed you.”

_ That’s obvious  _ Bokuto’s mind automatically supplies with circular characters. He can’t help but smile against the rim of the cup because just  _ hearing those words _ , it makes him feel better. He looks up from his tea and smiles at Akaashi. It’s...It’s really good, seeing him again. It probably feels surreal for Akaashi to see someone who all had accepted as dead. But for Bokuto, this is a dream come-true. You don’t expect miracles. For dreams, you want them to come true. You wish for them to be real. And having a dream so ridiculous, so otherworldly, come true….the feeling is indescribable in any of the languages he knows. 

훌륭한.

Wonderful. 

“I missed you too.” He says. One, two, three,  _ four  _ words. So the seventh word he has said to Akaashi since his return. 

“So how are you two doing?” Kuroo asks, suddenly appearing in the living room. “Sorry- had to go heat this up. You’re probably hungry.” A plate is placed in Bokuto’s lap and he doesn’t think he even heard a microwave go off. His eyes widen at the meat on the plate.  _ Yakiniku.  _ Technically, it isn’t grilled, it doesn’t even smell of smoke, but it’s the closest thing he’s had to his favorite food in months. 

He takes the chopsticks from Kuroo’s hand, daintily taking a piece. It smells so  _ good _ . He can hear the faint sizzling of the juices. He quickly takes a bit of the meat, ignoring how it burns his tongue. The flavoring, the feel. It’s all so familiar. 

“맛있다” he says to himself. 

“Eh? What did you say?” Kuroo perks up. 

“Oh, it’s delicious.” Bokuto says, quickly cleaning up after his mistake. “I, uh” he looks back at the plate. There’s so much left. Kuroo laughs, that ugly hyena cackle. 

“Don’t worry bro” he waves his hand. “Eat up. We’ll watch. You don’t know how cool it is seeing you with manners.” Bokuto’s cheeks burn and he looks back down at his plate. Kuroo and Akaashi start talking and Bokuto realizes that they’re filling him in on what’s been going on while he was gone. When he finishes eating, they continue talking, and they let him ask questions. He’s grateful they don’t ask any, even though he can see how much they want to. 

Minutes turn into hours. Kuroo somehow manages to smuggle lunch to them between topics of conversation. It’s interesting, what everyone has been up to. It’s as if his disappearance forced everyone he knew to start interacting with each other, to try and numb the gap he left rather than fill it in. 

And with the arrival of the passage of time, so does the arrival of people. 

Daichi and Oikawa are the first ones. Oikawa loudly exclaims his arrival, Daichi says something to him, too quickly for Bokuto’s mind to process since he’s still getting used to listening to Japanese. He’s caught himself a few times slipping into Korean and that’s actually a bit scary. 

He looks up right as Oikawa turns the corner. Their eyes meet. Bokuto has met the man, before yesterday, exactly once before: his first year of highschool, at the National Youth Training Camp. They were acquainted. They got along really nicely. It was also there Bokuto had met Ushijima too, experiencing first hand Oikawa’s disdain for the other. But that much be all in the past now, since they live together.

“Wait a moment!” Oikawa screechs, flinching back and pointing a finer at him. “You’re that volleyball guy- the, ugh” he snaps his fingers before pointing them at Bokuto again. “Yes! Kim Jin-Seong. What the hell are you doing here!?”

_ Jin _ . Jin blinks. Then he bites his tongue to keep from saying something back. That’s not his name. Jin’s not his name. Bokuto is-  _ Jin...I chose it for it’s chinese translation, gold _ . 

“Oh? We ran into you yesterday but it seems like I lost you. I’m sorry about that. Were you able to find your way?” Daichi asks, appearing from behind Oikawa. “Sit down, Oikawa. And stop pointing. You’re being rude.” Kuroo stares incredulously at Oikawa and Daichi, still looking surprised even after Daichi kisses his forehead before sitting down next to him. Akaashi’s brow furrows. 

“You don’t recognize him?” Akaashi asks. Bokuto turns his attention to his friend and raises an eyebrow. 

“You didn’t-” he starts in korean before muttering a low curse. “You didn’t recognize me at first too” Bokuto says, now in Japanese. “Don’t be so hard on him!”

“Oh I recognize you- you kept on blocking Toshi-kun in that game.” Oikawa grins. “Good job by the way, Jin-kun.” Bokuto’s fingers curl into his palm. He fights the feeling that starts to float across his mind, the months of conditioning fighting to put him under its control again. 

“Koutarou-kun” Bokuto corrects. “If you want to call me by my first name, do it properly.” Kuroo snickers. Akaashi’s face softens. Daichi’s eyes blow eide- smart guy- while Oikawa’s narrow. 

“Kouta-”  _ there  _ it is “WHAT THE-” he jumps onto his feet, rushing to Bokuto. He uses a hand to sweep back Bokuto’s hair, staring at his face intently. His jaw drops and he reels back, a hand flying up to cover his mouth. “B-bokuto?” He squeaks.

“It’s been a while” Bokuto smiles. Oikawa tips backwards, eyes rolling up. Bokuto stares down at him. He holds in a  _ pfft _ and then doubles over laughing. Daichi rushes to pick Oikawa off the ground, Akaashi stares at him with concern; Kuroo laughs with him. 

Their next victim, Ushijima, engages in a staring contest with Bokuto. By then , Oikawa and Daichi have been filled in on the conversation, they had the time to get used (kind of used to) having Bokuto back with them again. And Bokuto? He’s never been happier. He catches the glint of a tear in Akaashi’s eyes every now and then. And Ushijima, after breaking off the staring contest first, asks: “Why are you in Japan?”

Bokuto replies with: “I’ve finally been able to return home” he says. Ushijima blinks. 

“You have family here?”

“Yeah.” Shrug. “They think I’m dead, though, so I’ll have to fix-”

“Oh crap!” Kuroo jumps on his feet. “Let me get a phone for you Bo- you’re parents-”

“Hey hey-” Bokuto shakes his hands and head. “I have had enough for one day. I only want to relax now. I promise I’ll call them tomorrow.”

“Bo?” Ushijima looks so confused. “Is that a nickname?”

“Ushiwaka, you’re being stupid” Oikawa deadpans. “That’s Bokuto Koutarou. Turns out he’s alive and has been in Korea this whole time.” Ushijima blinks. 

“Oh. I see. Then…” the man awkwardly shuffles on his feet, moving closer to Bokuto. He holds a hand out. Bokuto stands instead, taking his hand and pulling him into a hug since the other man was probably too emotionally confused. A handshake? Really? And he’s really warm too.

“I missed all of you guys” Bokuto says. He closes his eyes. “I missed everything.”


	5. Chapter 5

Kuroo insisted that Bokuto sleep in the same room as him, forcing him to take the bed while he’d unroll a futon for himself. And he felt really bad about that, because he didn’t even put up a fuss. It made him partially angry, actually. At himself. He couldn’t argue against it, he couldn’t insist that he could take the couch (even though Akaashi is occupying it at the moment) or a futon. He just….relented. Accepted it. Even though he didn’t want to, it just-

He turns on the bed, pillow-warmed cheek now exposed to the chilled air.  _ Everything _ is a reminder. 

After another hour of listening to Kuroo’s loud breathing Bokuto got up. He quietly slipped out of bed, grabbing his friend’s phone from where it sat on the chest of drawers before escaping the room. Padding down the hallway, he opens the door to the balcony, unable to shake the fear that racks his body.  _ This is wrong this is wrong this is wrong _ . He’s not supposed to be up- he’s supposed to be asleep. He’s not supposed to wander- this isn’t his home. He doesn’t  _ have  _ a home anymore. How can he when he can barely even recognize himself?

Kuroo’s password hasn’t changed. The number at the top of the screen tells him that it’s one-thirty in the morning. He closes the balcony door behind him, swiping his finger across the screen until he finds the phone app. It’s a nice night, he notes. Cool, dark, the lights of the city still bright and creating a wispy layer of muted gold light across the horizon. 

The phone rings a few times, over a minute, Bokuto recalling every time it goes to voicemail. He feels so guilty- he’s probably waking them up, but he can’t find it in himself to really care. 

“Hello?” A sleep addled voice slurs. “Bok’to here.” His father’s kansai accent comes out thick and almost immediately Boktuo finds himself relaxing upon hearing that warm, slightly rough voice. He can’t believe he wanted to wait longer. Bokuto takes a few seconds to just listen to his dad yawn again, breathing deeply into the receiver. 

“Dad?” Bokuto says, the word coming out more like a question, a wish. A soft whisper that even he himself was barely able to hear. He lowers himself and sits against the short wooden walls of the balcony, pulling his knees to his chest. It’s quiet on the other end. And then, in the same volume as he had spoke in just a moment ago, comes a reply. 

“Koutarou? I- am I dreaming?”

“No, I-” he swallows. “I-I found my way back home. Dad” his voice breaks. 

He stays up, talking to his dad, and his sisters subsequently, for the next two hours. When he goes back inside, the fear that flashes through him is significantly less, even though the problem is that it’s still there. Although he is tired now, he knows he won’t be able to sleep with how much his heart is pounding. 

“Bokuto-san.” 

Bokuto flinches, not even letting out a yelp. His breath hitches and he spins on his heel, shoulders instantly curling in and arms wrapping around his midsection. It’s another testament to how worthless he’s become when he recognizes Akaashi and can’t relax. All of that peace, that contentment he felt outside….it’s gone now. 

Akaashi’s blue eyes are even more blue in the darkness. It’s obvious how he’s aged now, with the shadows making the lines of his jaw sharper and the darkness under his eyes more prominent. Akaashi stares at him, reaching a hand out. He’s saying something. 

“Daijōbu desuka?” 

He knows those words- he knows he does. But right when it comes to the front of his mind, it’s overtaken by confusion. There’s one thing, though, which doesn’t need any translation: the look on Akaashi’s face. The concern. The worry. Two very similar yet distinct things. 

“I-” he swallows the lump in his throat. He raises Kuroo’s phone. It comes back to him. “I couldn’t sleep. I was making a call.” Akaashi looks at him strangely for a few seconds before his face relaxes. Bokuto walks past him, returning the phone to its original spot on the chest of drawers, careful that he doesn’t accidentally kick Kuroo. He looks over his shoulder and Akaashi is standing in the doorway like a protective spirit. Bokuto smiles to himself. Just a gentle, soft upturn of a corner. 

He followers the loyal setter to the living room. He waits for Akaashi to sit down first before following en suit, making sure that there’s at least a cushion of space. It’s silence which envelops the two for a few minutes. Bokuto is content with it, occasionally glancing at the other to see if he’d fallen asleep: he was always met back with a continuous gaze. It didn’t bother him. 

“Bokuto-san” Akaashi starts as usual, voice soft and safe, tugging at Bokuto’s mind like a lure. “I’m not going to attempt to do anything to make you uncomfortable. To be honest, I am more than happy simply with your being here.” Bokuto looks over at Akaashi and he sees that Akaashi is fiddling with his fingers.  _ Fiddling with his fingers _ . He may not know that much about Akaashi’s habits, but he does know  _ that _ . He’s nervous. Akaashi, he’s nervous. With  _ him _ . 

That’s never happened after their first meeting in his second year. 

Bokuto opens his mouth but he can’t find himself to say anything. The thing is, he doesn’t know what to say. At least, not the way he used to be able to. What words should he use? How should he make his sentences? He wants to be that boisterous kid he used to be, the one who would talk and talk and talk and be able to ramble about the things he loved for hours. And all of that was only ten months ago. 

And now...he can’t even muster the strength to say a sentence to his best friend. Well, he  _ can _ , he just doesn’t know how. He really doesn’t know how to do anything anymore. And to be honest, just in itself is really depress-

“Rule number two: when Bokuto-san wants to be quiet, he will only talk louder. If he really is quiet, it is an indication of him truly being upset.” Bokuto looks at Akaashi. He’s looking right at him. The last syllable wavers in the air like a ghost. Akaashi’s fingers are no longer fiddling with each other, instead calm and steady. Like how he remembers them. “Rule number eight: Bokuto-san doesn’t like it when others are upset or sad, and will often bear those feelings in order to prevent others from experiencing them.” Akaashi turns his body so that he’s facing Bokuto. He’s...speechless. 

“You….still remember them?” He still remembers when Akaashi drawled about how he should make a list of weaknesses a month into his first year at Fukurodani. And….Akaashi kept up. He never mentioned it to Bokuto directly, but he heard from Konoha and the others how Akaashi would occasionally pop out “rule number….”. At first, they thought it was him merely being sarcastic but then they started to repeat. Same rule, same number. Bokuto had loved the attention back then. 

He can’t help but love that Akaashi somehow remembers them. 

“You don’t like it when others are sad, so you will do your best to relieve them of those feelings,” Akaashi repeats “even if it includes hiding problems of our own. It is okay to admit when you are sad, Bokuto-san. When you are upset, when you are angry. You may be thinking about how you are not the person you used to be, but that is alright. I can wait. All of us can wait. Take your time, that is all I ask.”

His mouth slightly parts, eyes widening the slightest bit. 

“Akaashi…” He closes his mouth, licking parched lips. His eyes sting. “I-I’m” his fingers curl. “Upset.” Akaashi nods. 

“Why?”

The sting turns into a prickle and Bokuto finds himself lunging to the side, wrapping his arms around his friends and putting his head on his shoulder. He rambles, a mixture of Korean and Japanese, of syllables of na, ga, da versus ka, ki, ku. And all along, Akaashi holds him, barely putting any pressure on him, just a feather touch that both grounds him and doesn’t disturb him. Bokuto cries into his shoulder, and slowly but surely, it’s not pieces from different puzzles he’s trying to jam together. 

Akaashi, he nods along. He doesn’t say anything. He just continues being him. Existing. Caring. Helping. 

“You’re safe, Bokuto-san. Do remember that. If you do not, I will be glad to remember you.” Akaashi looks down at Bokuto, eyebrows raising slightly when he realizes he’s asleep. He smiles at him before closing his own, tipping his head back against the back of the couch and shifting his arm to ensure that Bokuto doesn’t roll off in his sleep. He opens his eyes, staring up at the ceiling. He opens his mouth. 

“Oh.”

The syllables he’d been able to understand, all of them finally arranged in his head, painting a story of terror and hopelessness and torture. Of rewiring and rebuilding and surviving. Bokuto’s head grows heavier on his shoulder. Akaashi allows himself to raise one hand, to give in and comb it through hair dyed blacker than his own. The strands are soft, a few short strands of his natural silver visible. 

“My own rule number one” Akaashi whispers, “Is that I have and always will care for you more than anyone could possibly think.” He closes his eyes and forces unconsciousness onto himself.


	6. Chapter 6

Recovery...it was hard. His return wasn’t made public since he wants anything but the attention. He lived with his dad for a good two days before he realized it would be better if he was with his friends, able to distract him when the memories and fear starts to overcome him. 

So he moved in officially with Kuroo and Daichi at the nicely sized apartment they share with Ushijima and Oikawa. The ace apologized, first thing. He had considered them friends and he had failed, became undeserving of that title, when he was unable to get Bokuto out months earlier. He was quick to be forgiven. But that still didn’t keep Ushijima from sticking close to Bokuto, going out of his way to spend time with him. Bokuto would of pointed it out before but Ushijima always looks so happy in that way most people don’t notice. You can tell by how his face relaxes, how his brow raises from it’s near-constant furrowed position, making his eyes seem larger and more curious. And he’s been able to learn more about Ushijima, to become better friends with him. And really, he’s almost had to start from scratch with most of his relationships. It’s different than what they had before but he knows he’ll get used to it. 

The recovery process itself, even to Bokuto, was slow. He just wanted to be himself again but how he is right now, that feels normal. If he were to try to be like who he once was, who’s to say that he’ll fit that skin? But he forces himself, because if you fake something enough times, it becomes true. 

The smiles, they start to come easier. The conversations flow better. The flinches are still there but he reminds himself to look up and around every so often so that someone is supposedly sudden appearance doesn’t take him by surprise and lead him into a scare. 

“Bokuto-san,” Akaashi asks one day while he’s visiting. Konoha and Washio had visited the day before, leaving Bokuto in a very happy mood. He looks up, brushing the hair out of his eyes.

“Yeah? What is it, Akaashi?” 

“I have had this question for a while now, but...if you don’t mind me asking, and do know that you don’t have to answer-”

“Hey, it’s fine,” Bokuto says with a smile. He pats the cushion next to him. “Sit?” Akaashi nods and places himself next to him. Bokuto leans back into the couch. “Go ahead.”

“You never mentioned how you got on the South Korean National Team in the first place.” The silence that follows permeates the air, but it’s not cold or forewarning. Bokuto is just thinking. Volleyball is always the one constant. Technically, volleyball is responsible for him being taken, making him be at the place at the time of his taking.

“It was two months after I was taken, I think. The guy who bought me-” Akaashi stiffens at the word. 

“Bokuto-”

“Sorry, sorry, Mr. Meanie guy” he continues, even though he didn’t miss the sadness that crossed Akaashi’s face at the first stumble. He needs to be more careful. Re-write the programming, believe it until it’s the truth. “He said I was behaving well and that I could ask for anything as long as it was within reason. It was only practice for a while but then their ace injured themselves and the coach persuaded Mr. Meanie guy to allow me to take his spot. That was when I played Ushijima. Akaashi’s eyes narrow. At least the sadness is gone but now there’s anger. 

“He didn’t recognize you?” His voice comes quiet and dangerous. Bokuto doesn’t want Ushijima to get into trouble- it wasn’t his fault that he was in that situation. Just like how it wasn’t Kageyama’s or anyone else’s. 

“...so didn’t you.” He decides to say. He sees almost immediately how the words affect Akaashi. The setter slumps, looking away from Bokuto. “But I don’t blame any of you. I- when I looked in the mirror after some time so many months ago, I couldn’t recognize myself. I mean” he huffs “I can barely recognize myself even now.”

Akaashi doesn’t speak up. Bokuto is actually glad for this. He doesn’t want to be coddled at every waking moments, to have ideas supported or refuted, to be aided. Sometimes, most of the time, he wants to be independent. Yes, he wants to be close to his friends. Yes, he wants to laugh and talk and cry and sing without fear of being judged or pitied. Yet...yet what? Even that he’s not sure of. 

“It’s been three weeks,” Akaashi says. He looks at Bokuto with a scrutinizing look unlike the ones he used to give him on the court after certain plays. “Do you remember what dye was used?”

“Huh?”

“For your hair.” Akaashi states the obvious. “Do you remember what type was used to dye it

“Um...yeah? Why do you ask?”

“I think I know someone who might be able to help you with something…”

Two hours later, he’s taken to a professional hair salon. The smell of hair product overwhelms him but it doesn’t smell bad. He has to push back against the urge to take in a few deep, loud inhales which will probably gather a few people’s attention. Akaashi talks to the person at the desk quickly, waving to Bokuto. The man is quick to nod and leads the two, but not before Akaashi gives him a photo. Bokuto wonders what’s happening. He doesn’t need a haircut. Did Akaashi just want him to accompany him? He could have just asked- he would of come. 

Turns out Bokuto is the one getting treated, but not to a haircut. The employee massages his hair, threading fingers through his hair and getting tangles out. Bokuto is reclined back the majority o the time, his hair doused a few times with something that’s not water, then shampooed, then rinsed, then repeat. It takes a long time but Bokuto relaxes under skilled fingers. He has nearly fallen asleep when the employee softly says that he’s done, tilting the chair back up so that Bokuto can look in the mirror as the employee finishes drying his hair and brushing it free of knots and tangles. 

He recognizes himself is all that he thinks as he reaches up and slides his fingers through a conditioner softened and smoothed white lock of hair, black streaking through just the way he likes it. The photograph. 

“Akaashi” his voice breaks. It’s, it’s not fair. Why- why do they care so much? And why is it affecting him so much?

“A yakiniku restaurant opened in the time you were over seas. Would you like to eat there?”


	7. Chapter 7

After two months of living with Kuroo and his flatmates, Bokuto learned two things: 1) He’s become  _ really  _ good at acting; 2) He isn’t doing that much better than when he came. 

Sure, it’s noticeable that he’s a little better, at least. He doesn’t randomly switch to Korean (he pauses before he can). He doesn’t flinch at people’s touch (if he sees them coming). When he looks in the mirror...he recognizes himself (and then there are days where he nearly punches the mirror because  _ there’s someone with white hair in his apartment he has no idea who that man is _ ). 

Ah, yes- he moved out. 

They didn’t vocally protest but even Bokuto could tell that  _ all  _ of the people living in that perfectly cramped apartment didn’t want him to leave. Be it out of distrust or concern, he doesn’t know...and he doesn’t want the answer. The only things he had to move was the duffle he carried across the East Sea and the barely used suitcase Kuroo had lent him (against his will) with the clothes and few nick-nacks he gathered (was given) during the time he lived with them. 

It was something he’d been thinking about since Korea, actually. He didn’t want to be a burden when he returned, when he thought the trauma would last forever and never go away. When the hopes of going home suddenly plummeted and all thoughts of it strengthened the depression which he still nurtures. 

His dad paid for the apartment...well...more like he basically gave Bokuto a loaded credit card with more money than he’ll need for the next ten years. Money that people donated to his family when they assumed he was dead as well as money which his sisters and dad gave to him out of guilt. Because even they thought he had been dead. 

The place that’s supposed to be his home now is a pre-furnished one bed and one bath apartment. It’s new, the smell of paint permeating the air and helping to ground Bokuto to the present. 

It was also lonely, even with the well-meant stream of texts he’d get everyday- he would have thought that everyone would have gotten used to him being back and that the attention he’d get would ceases. Also, for some reason, he likes the loneliness. Sure, it eats at him, but he also revels in there being  _ nobody _ . He doesn’t have to turn a corner and put a mask on if he isn’t feeling all that normal, if he wants to he can sing the words of a song in a language that would sound like gibberish to most people. 

Collapsing on the couch with one leg dangling off the armrest and the other off the back, Bokuto stares at the blank TV screen. 

“What to do, what to do,” he says in Korean. He rolls off the couch and onto the ground, getting a nice view of the tiny threads of the rug. Stretching his arms out, he grasps the edge of the rug, running his thumbs over it. Not soft, on the rough side. It scratches a bit at his skin, the threads close together and not at all loose enough to be close to the texture of carpeting. He likes it very much. It’s really...grounding and entrancing. Distracting. Just move those thumbs, run them over and over again over the coarse material until his fingers feel raw. It’s not really entertaining, and only a few minutes must have passed. Releasing his left hand’s grip on the carpet, he groups the table for his phone, finding it after some time. He thinks it’s been a few minutes? Yeah, seems like that. But he doesn’t really feel like getting up…

“I can watch anime?” He tells himself.  _ I can watch anime!  _ That thought alone brings a strange amount of joy in him, one that he shouldn’t really be feeling at the thought of watching an animated series. Good animated serieses, but animated nonetheless. What does he need to watch? What show had he been watching months ago? He thinks Washio had recommended it- no, not a series, a movie.  _ Howl’s Moving Castle _ , yes. He thinks he tried watching it as a kid (his sisters made him) but he had quickly lost interest. 

Padding over to his bedroom, he grabs the blanket and returns to the couch, wrapping himself up in its soft embrace before snatching the remote and turning the TV on. 

One thing is for sure, it’s a  _ really  _ good movie. One move leads to two and before he knows it, dinner and hunger have been ignored (not like he hasn’t done it before) in favor of entertainment. It’s a good thing, he knows. Akaashi had tried to persuade him to find a passion again, something which he can stick to and get absorbed into. It’s not like he can always play volleyball, the aches and pains that form from overexertion being enough to make him abstain for a day or two. Anime, at least, is lighthearted (most of the time), makes him smile, and is separated enough from being real that the dark backstories don’t bother him that much. 

After a night of sleep deprivation and burning eyes, he falls asleep at eight eight in the morning and wakes up at five in the afternoon to Kuroo poking him awake.  _ Oh, right- spare key  _ is the first thing that comes to mind. The second thing that does is why Kuroo is here so early, that thought quickly snatched away when Kuroo flatly tells him what time it is and why he hasn’t been answering anyone’s call. Bokuto feels like curling up upon looking at the expression on his face ( _ oh, so it’s fine to see people getting beat up in a movie but it’s not fine to see anger on a living person’s face?)  _ but he forces himself not to, instead making himself smile lazily. 

“Oh, hey Kuroo,” he fake yawns, scratching the back of his head, pushing himself up into a sitting position. “I must have lost track of time- I was sleeping.”

“I could see that,” Kuroo drawls. “Now the question is  _ why _ . You really had us really worried, bro. I had to keep Akaashi from running over here.”

“I was up late watching anime!” Bokuto exclaims, waving his arms and pushing back the guilt, widening his eyes to hopefully react an intense amount of excitement. “Dude, I forgot how  _ good  _ it was, y’know? It’s just so light and easy and nice to watch.” The serious expression on Kuroo’s face, just like that, easily melts away. He releases a light laugh and leans against the back of the couch, arms folded. The tall man is dressed what is obviously houseware with a cloak thrown on, probably to hide how mismatched his clothes are. His taste in fashion, at least, hasn’t changed. Bokuto, on the other hand, whereas he once got clothes in his exact size and usually in blacks and solid colors since the only thing he knows about fashion is that most solid colors looks good with black, he had gotten oversized hoodies, loose jeans, high-wasted baggy pants, cropped jackets, all with brand names or strange repetitive images, or imagines, on them. The only other thing is that he doesn’t actually have the confidence to wear them. The only reason those were the things we bought because that was  _ all  _ he knew about fashion, all that he was forced to learn. He didn’t hate all of his time in Korean, especially that with his team. Going out with the rest of the guys after “school”, meeting up somewhere equal distance from their cities. His “dad” giving him money, proud that he was going out and being normal, trusting him enough for some reason. Eating out, trying tons of street foods, getting excited over what was supposed to be common Korean street food, going shopping, messing around. The few rare times he’d been allowed to go to peoples houses (although never having them over) and playing games and sneakily looking with awe at how  _ kind  _ their parents were. 

It makes him feel homesick-

“Hey, you okay there?” Kuroo asks, suddenly in front of him. When? “You suddenly zoned out. I was talking about  _ Gake no ue no Ponyo _ . You weren’t even nodding along….,” Bokuto tries to meet Kuroo’s eyes but for once, it’s the other who looks away. “Are you okay, Bo? I mean, I know if you were to tell the truth for once,” that doesn’t bother him, for some reason, that it turns out Kuroo knew along he’d been acting,”you would say that you aren’t okay. And you know what?” He sits down next to Bokuto, face surprisingly earnest. “That’s alright.” He drapes an arm across Bokuto’s shoulders, squeezing his arm. “I’m not going to be like Oikawa or Akaashi or the others, trying to make you okay and comfortable super quickly- you’ll go at your own pace. No one can control what your brain drags out and makes you think about, only influence it. If you ever need to talk, I’m here, okay?” Bokuto opens his mouth. He wants to tell the truth, he wants to get the truth off his chest. He never acknowledged it before but how did  _ clothes  _ get him to figure it out, the thing that is responsible for the hollowness in his chest?

“I miss home.” He barely keeps his voice from cracking. Not this home, not his father’s home, not Kuroo’s apartment, but his home across the sea. “I know I shouldn’t, but I miss it so much.” Kuroo’s hand moves up until he’s threading his fingers through Bokuto’s hair, lightly untangling the strands. 

“Can you say that again in Japanese?” Kuroo lightly jokes but Bokuto knows if he were to lean forward and look at his friend’s face, there would either be, from best case scenario to worse: interest, confusion, concern, or sadness. 

“What’s that movie about?” He smiles while pulling out from Kuroo’s hold. “Also, do you want anything to eat or drink? I’m grabbing myself some milk.”

“Sure, why not.”

  
  
  
  


After the movie, Kuroo stays. Bokuto insists that he should go and have dinner but Kuroo shakes his head. There’s a glint of annoyance in his eyes and even though he look relaxed, he lounges determinedly on the couch. 

“I don’t know much about Korean but I do know that all of those syllables you had said in the tomne you said them in couldn’t have meant what the movie is about.” 

Bokuto doesn’t stiffen but he sends a weary glance Kuroo’s way, one too old for his age. Kuroo’s face can show emotion but in the heat of the moment, he mentally comes to the conclusion that Akaashi is much more physically emotional at moments like this. He’s not sure if he really likes how, well,  _ normal  _ Kuroo behaves but he finds that it provides a nice balance to the dramatics others can do. It’s what anyone would love from their best friend. Bokuto loves that Kuroo has that quality. He thinks that Kuroo used to love the energy that Bokuto used to have instead of being this weary, paranoid guy who can never act like himself in public. 

“Yeah, I did lie,” Bokuto can’t help but say guilty- he can feel his own hair droop further. His fingers twitch, wanting to curl up. He grips his knees instead. I, uh, I miss Korea. I don’t know why but...I’m homesick.” He can’t bring himself to look at Kuroo, his bangs helping to block him from his peripheral view even. “A-and I...I feel so  _ bad  _ about it! This, Japan, it’s supposed to be home. But I keep on thinking about the street sandwiches and eomuk-” he cuts himself off, his thoughts already starting to seamlessly transition back into Korean. He glares at the rug between his feet, blinking back the angry, hot tears which prickle behind his eyelids. Obviously, there’s hesitation, but all that matters is the end result. He can hear Kuroo move over to sit beside him, careful to not touch him. 

“That’s okay,” Kuroo says. Bokuto looks up in shock. “Thank you for telling me, Bo.”

“You-you’re okay with that?” He breathes. “You don’t, there’s nothing wrong.”

“Of course not!” Kuroo says with an honest smile, no hidden worry or concern. “People change, Bo. Heck,  _ I’ve  _ changed!”

“That’s only because of Sawamura,” Bokuto mutters, finally bringing himself to look up at his best friend. Kuroo’s smile churns cheeky. 

“Not my fault an amazing guy somehow saw something in me. Anyway, as much as a lot of us may hope, you’re never going to become the guy you once were. So many things have happened to us, things that we know and things we’ll never be directly told both. 

But, you’re trying your best. Not to become the guy you once were but to come to terms with the guy you are  _ now _ . And that’s all that matters! You’re still  _ you _ . And as long as you don’t lose sight of your core values or whatever, it doesn’t matter whatever changes about you. Just stay as Bokuto Koutarou.” Bokuto opens his mouth but Kuroo cuts him off, the next words that exit his mouth making the doubt he felt disappear absolutely. “And if there’s also another wicked volleyball player by the name of Jin in there, well, that’s also more than fine.”

Unable to hold himself back anymore, Bokuto throws himself at Kuroo, embracing his friend. Somehow, Kuroo’s hold is tighter. 

**Author's Note:**

> Sooooooo........................how did you fellas like that?


End file.
